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Inevitably, employers will determine that increasing the salaries of some of their previously exempt employees to comply with the new overtime rule is not economically or practically feasible. Suddenly, businesses will be required to account for newly nonexempt employees’ work time and, to the extent necessary, will take proactive steps to ensure that they are not working over 40 hours in a workweek.

Implementing written policies and providing training to employees converted from exempt to nonexempt status are good starting places. For many employees, the conversion will represent a complete culture change and will present a difficult transition. Just because such employees are no longer classified as exempt does not mean that they will stop thinking—or, more importantly, acting—like exempt employees.